


flowerhead

by divinehedonism



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Ancient Egypt, Angst, Confessions, Drunkenness, First Kiss, Flowers, Fluff, Language of Flowers, M/M, Magical Tattoos, Modern Era, Tattoos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-15
Updated: 2019-12-15
Packaged: 2021-02-26 07:20:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,596
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21809455
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/divinehedonism/pseuds/divinehedonism
Summary: More often than not, he found his legs laid out in front of him in the yellow-warm dunes; the eyes and scales and ivy, the long needles of his fingers tracing the dark lines until his skin felt raw and open. His thumb brushed over the soft petals of each flower, punctuated with a shiver that he found never warmed.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 12
Kudos: 82





	flowerhead

**Author's Note:**

> it's been what? like 5 months? im just a cryptid that occasionally comes out of the woods to post some dumb shit then recede back into the mud
> 
> [and yes its named after an oh!hello song don't @ me](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BkjEzTCZ7u8)

He’s always been fascinated by humankind’s talent with body ink.

Hell always used it to brand, to remind them of _what_ they were, vermin and pests all the same. _Crawley._

_Heaven had marks, too. Delicate gold things, they were. He can’t remember his._

But wonderful, creative humans told stories and kept sentiments with them, drunken bets ending badly with unfortunate (permanent) outcomes. Tattoos became one of the first rebellions and came in many forms, from tiny stick-n-poke dice to full-blown _artistry._

Crowley, needless to say, _loved it._

His first was decided for him by a kind woman named Itet, as he’d been lurking around for ages, watching her skilled hands ink symbols into any willing (and paying) bodies. Her work was stunning, but like many others before and to come, was lost to time.

She’d joked about his watchfulness, and had suggested an eye. Several eyes, as it came to be, interlinking as scales; colors alternating between green and black, with a single blue one in the dead center of the pattern. It wrapped around his calf, like a brace, and stood out quite strikingly against his milky-white skin. He tried not to think about Aziraphale.

“Remind you of someone?” she asked, brown eyes shimmering, lips pulling upwards into an inviting smile.

“Maybe.” he responded, noncommittal, but his questioning nature got the better of him, “Why?”

“I can see it.” she had pointed at his eyes, then, giving him yet another reason to get lenses. ~~To hide.~~

“Slow and creeping, I understand. Perhaps you’d do better with ivy…” she mused, glancing at the dark green pigment thoughtfully, “your spark was fast, almost blinding, but I see nothing has yet to come. It will, with time. Slow, but ever persistent.”

He had felt burned then, had felt _known_ and _open_ like he never wanted to feel again, but he ended up getting the damn thing anyway. Itet had taken her bronze-tipped kit and let ivy sneak up his other leg, a mirror image of the other. _Parallels_ , he found himself thinking, unwisely; _the same, but always destined to never cross._

She snuck the same blue ink from the middlemost eye into the design, tiny pops of color that made Crowley’s heart _pound,_ for the ivy looked too much like a serpent, and the flowers, in their beauty, reminded him.

He thanked Itet shakily, though with a sort of genuineness that he had never thought himself capable of, leaving a generous tip with a wave of his hand.

She gave him a kind smile, eyes betraying so much _knowing_ that he knew she couldn’t have been anything other than human. Strange lot, but distinctly _themselves_ in a way Crowley found himself craving.

_More often than not, he found his legs laid out in front of him in the yellow-warm dunes; the eyes and scales and **ivy** , the long needles of his fingers tracing the dark lines until his skin felt raw and open. His thumb brushed over the soft petals of each flower, punctuated by a shiver that he found never warmed._

Over the centuries, he got more and more, albeit infrequently. _C. viticella (błękitny anioł)_ littered the freckled, ivory skin of his bicep, lavender petals teasing the bend of his elbow as they travelled down, just short of his palm. The bells of _F. meleagris_ found themselves mirrored just below his collar bone, facing each other shyly, head down, the end of their leaves upturned playfully in an act of rebellion, tentatively asking for a dance.

He had gotten a serpent that wrapped snugly around his other arm. It was reminiscent of a python; scales shining with a supernatural iridescence that only caught in the sun. He could feel it move, sometimes. He didn’t know if it was his gifted imagination or something to do with the otherworldly presence he felt when he stumbled upon that particular shop. Either way, it shifted below his skin, threatening to come alive.

Crowley _barely_ remembers the Acacia blossoms, so inebriated he could barely ask for a cab back to his flat. He promptly slept for a month, waking up with a string of delicate white petals draped across his shoulder blades and a blinding headache (he probably wouldn’t have even noticed the tattoo had it not hurt like _hell,_ even through the headache). Gradually, he began to recall bits and pieces of that night, and immediately felt a pit form in the deepest recesses of his stomach. _It was a confession. He couldn’t stop himself from talking. It was pathetic, the way he sounded; words tinged with lovesick wanting. He doesn’t know if he suggested the damn things or not, and he doubts he’ll ever know._

He hasn’t gotten another one since.

The demon takes great care not to show any of them; his heart splayed out carelessly in the lines of his skin, tying together a story of longing, buried beneath metaphors and perfectly innocuous symbols ( _the only safe option_ , he thought, _so it doesn’t eat me alive_.)

Then Armageddon happened (or, rather, didn’t), and they ended up _surviving_ , which was completely unexpected. A brand new world, which was, of course, ample reason for a nightcap.

“Crowley,” Aziraphale spoke with wine-soaked breath and a smile that made the demon’s heart stutter on the _best_ of days, “you never did mention your tattoos. They are simply _exquisite,_ I daresay I’m envious. _”_

_Fuck. That wasn’t fair. He had to know what he was doing._

“I. Mgwk. Well...they never really came up in conversation, did they?”

“They are now.”

“They’re just silly little ink scribbles, I got them because they are suitably demonic, y’know?”

“Each one is so master... _masterfully_ crafted, I doubt that’s true.”

Aziraphale’s eyes seemed to plead with him, asking to be let in. You know how well Crowley does at denying it.

“Alright, fine. What d’ you wanna know?”

“May I see them?”

His eyes shot open, sobering up considerably.

“I—”

“Sorry, sorry,” the angel rushed out, “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable, I’ll just—”

“No, it’sss...it’s alright,” He swallowed nervously, taking off his coat, “I'll show you.”

With shaky hands, he unbuttoned the sleeves of his shirt and folded them back, exposing the intricate veins of ink. _C. viticella_ seemed to taunt him.

_You know what it means. He can’t find out._

The serpent said nothing. The black ink didn’t shift, and Crowley was grateful.

“I’m afraid I didn’t get a chance to admire them.” Aziraphale whispered, reverent. And if _that_ didn’t make Crowley have the occult equivalent of a fucking aneurysm, the soft hands tracing the outline of the dark ink did.

“Ah, well, that’s underssstandable. With you putting on a ssshow for Hell an’ all.”

Crowley was about to rip out his _bless_ ed tongue if it didn’t stop making him hiss like a damned fool.

Aziraphale hummed, “Still, I’m quite pleased to have gotten another chance at this.”

Crowley was prepared to take those words and stow them away, use them as fuel for a trepid hope that _someday_ he might know what it feels like to take Aziraphale’s hand, to know what the angel’s lips felt like against his own, to let out the love he _knows_ he shouldn’t have and to have it be reciprocated in kind. He was prepared to do this because he had done it a thousand times before, when Aziraphale’s eyes looked the same as they do now, when his words held the same tone.

But this time, he doesn’t have to. Because Aziraphale’s lips are meeting his own, and Crowley, quite frankly, is surprised he hasn’t discorporated.

It’s _everything_. He doesn’t care how cheesy that sounds, not with how light his chest feels. He doesn’t feel damned or holy; it’s an entirely new state of _other_ that he never dreamed to feel. It’s lawless, with beseeching hands and mouths sewing threads of love into his very core, imbuing him with a sense of weightlessness unknown to even Her.

Crowley feels known, but this time, it’s not scary. Hell, it’s not even terrifying. It’s something so far beyond, so far removed that it loops back around to being considered a form of contentedness.

_Is this real? Drunk kiss? Lifelong Companions That Just Survived the Apocalypse Celebratory Kiss That Doesn’t Mean Anything Don’t Read Into It?_

And then Aziraphale drew back, literally _glowing_ , and the last of Crowley’s concerns dissipated. _No. This is real. This is home._

“I believe that was long overdue.”

“Understatement of the millenium.” Crowley snarked, though the sentiment was lost because of the utterly lovesick smile plastered across his face.

“I do have _one_ more question,” Aziraphale drawled, fingers skimming the inside of the demon’s wrist, “what kind of flowers are they? They are simply lovely.”

“A variant of Clematis viticella.” Crowley said softly, squirming at the praise, “ _Błękitny Anioł._ A friend, Stefan, created them.”

“Why, that’s—”

“ _Blue Angel_ ,” Crowley muttered, “yes, right, don’t start. ‘s embarrassing enough.”

“Oh, that’s ever _so_ _sweet..._ ”

Later, Crowley told him of Itet, of the story that went along with the ivy and thatchwork eyes ( _“Smart woman,” Aziraphale smirked, “she knew it even before I did.”_ ), and the story behind the restless snake that coiled around his arm in a vice grip. The _F. meleagris’_ often found themselves being divided by the angel’s hand, right over his heart.

The Acacias were found out much later, which prompted Crowley to tell him what exactly they meant. Through flustered nonsense syllables, of course.

It became one of Aziraphale’s favorite places to kiss, along with the rest of him.

**Author's Note:**

> comments and kudos are much appreciated! 
> 
> come say hi on tumblr [@divinehedonism](https://divinehedonism.tumblr.com/), send me a prompt if you'd like!


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